Here’s the thing, no one ever told me that training step 3 would be a whole different world. I knew he had to learn how to pee standing up, but I didn’t realize how unnaturally it would come. And I certainly wasn’t expecting how much “fun” he’d have trying to learn. One day when I picked my son up from school, his teachers warned me that he was showing interest in standing up to pee like some of the older kids. GREAT! I thought. Really. I was excited for him to take this big step… until we got home. My son sort of hovered over the toilet seat almost to the point of where he was going to fall in. With seat raised he leaned both hands up against the bottom of the seat (you know, the area that has some pee splashes on it). So after I got over the shock of him placing his hands in stale pee, off he shot. I quickly had to grab his unit so that he didn’t spray the bathroom any further. As I stood there holding on I realized the assisting aspect was one part of motherhood I wasn’t quite ready for. Thankfully, his interest in peeing standing up was short lived. In no time he was back to wanting to sit on the toilet. I know that probably shouldn’t make me happy but it is certainly a much cleaner process. Relief.

Until now. My son is once again interested in peeing standing up, he’s a few months older and while I’m not totally ready to embrace this learning process again, I’m a bit more prepared. What I wasn’t prepared for this time is that now he REALLY wants to take responsibility. He doesn’t want mom holding his unit. Which I can respect. However, every time he goes pee now, the process has become much more time consuming. Why? Because while he likes to try to pee in the toilet standing up, he also thinks it’s funny to squirt the lid, the seat, the floor, whatever is striking his fancy at the moment. And while you think you can redirect them, in the moment, there isn’t a whole heck of a lot you can do to gain control or convince him that spraying the bathroom is just plain gross. My bathrooms are now stocked with Clorox wipes and paper towels. On an exceptionally unlucky day, like today, it’s trash day and the trash is already at the curb. This means that unless I empty my bathroom trash yet again, I will have pee soaked paper towels sitting in the trash for a week. And to top it off, also on a day like today, I forgot how quickly the pee streams down the cracks in the tiles – until I step in it and feel the pee on the bottom of my socks and pajama legs. Ahh, the joys of potty training. Looks like I will adding Cheerios to my list of bathroom supplies so we can use them for target practice. Open to any other suggestions you may have too.